


A Desperate Secret

by MaryAnne615



Category: Female M (James Bond) - Fandom, James Bond (Craig movies), James Bond (Movies), James Bond/M - Fandom, Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-08
Updated: 2014-05-08
Packaged: 2018-01-23 23:38:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1583630
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaryAnne615/pseuds/MaryAnne615
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I was never in the camp of 'Silva was M's son' but someone challenged me to write a story where it turned out he was. I could never resist a challenge!  It's five years after M was almost killed at Skyfall.  She's retired and it's the holiday season.  She invites Bond to her country house to spend the holiday with her three children and their families.  Although their relationship is far different than when she was the head of MI6, there are still secrets out there regarding Silva.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Desperate Secret

James Bond truly hated this time of year. Hated the snow and cold, the trees covered in lights, the merry mood that everyone seemed to be in where ever he went. He was actually looking forward to seeing M at MI6 Headquarters…employees at the Secret Intelligence Service as a rule didn’t decorate their offices. There would be little or no Christmas cheer there.

  
Deep inside MI6, Tanner gave him a quick ‘go on in’ wave before turning back to his computer. On his way into the corner office, Bond was amused to see that the areas outside the SIS Chief’s office were decorated with Christmas ornaments, lights, and trinkets. Carols were playing somewhere. The previous M would never have allowed such a thing. Oh, she would have allowed a small tree perhaps or one small decoration on each employee’s desk. But nothing compared to what Bond was looking at now.

***

The meeting with M went well. Things were slowing down over the holidays and M wanted Bond to take a rest before heading out on mission in January. They shook hands, exchanged holiday greetings and parted. Bond headed toward the elevator, intent on getting out quickly.

  
Bond saw her before she saw him. She was walking with Tanner and having a lively conversation, the kind they would never have had under her tenure. She was actually laughing out loud at something her former Chief of Staff said. Since her retirement a year ago, four years after being severely wounded at Skyfall, Bond had heard her laugh many times and found he enjoyed the warm tone of her laughter.

  
Bond also missed talking with Tanner. While he had a good working relationship with the current M it wasn’t the same as with her so he didn’t spend as much time in the office as before. Bond couldn’t quite put a finger on the reason; it was just there, noticed and felt, but unidentified.

  
“Bond, always good to see you,” she said, finally seeing him and approaching him slowly. She still walked with a cane, probably would for the rest of her life. At Skyfall she had barely escaped with her life, suffering massive blood loss and nerve damage. Bond was still amazed that she had survived and recovered so quickly. He had seen agents succumb to lesser injuries.

  
As he watched her approach, his mind started playing three distinct memories of her at the church, the same ones played every time he saw her. First, Silva holding her with their faces touching, both of their hands on a gun, the muzzle resting against her temple. Then the shock on her face as she tried to figure out why Silva had pulled away from her, dropping the gun. Bond could still hear the sound of it hitting the floor.

  
Finally, her struggling to stand up straight while chiding him for being so late and then falling into his arms, already half dead.

  
There were never just one or two scenes, always those three, and always in order, as if his thoughts would never allow him to forget exactly what happened in Scotland almost five years ago.

  
His first visit to her in hospital in Glasgow had not gone well. He had tracked her progress through Tanner, staying away and not wanting to interfere with the initial fight to save her life. But once he knew she wasn’t going to die he had finally gone to her room, his anger finally getting the best of him.

  
“Damn you, M,” he opened the conversation, not even bothering with trivial greetings. Not even bothering to ask her how she was feeling or if she needed anything. He didn’t even notice that she was still hooked up to multiple IVs and a machine and was probably drugged out of her mind. He was angry at her for almost bleeding to death to prove some point that Bond hadn’t yet figured out.

  
And as he berated her for being stupid and stubborn, her calm demeanor only made him angrier. He called her irresponsible and childish and uncaring for anyone but herself. He called her unbelievably selfish. The tirade went on for almost 10 minutes before he finally stopped, exhausted. But he felt better, finally getting those words off of his chest and out into the open, even if she was still in a hospital bed.

  
“Are you finished?” she said quietly, smoothing the sheets with her hands.

  
“Yes,” he said, sitting in the chair next to her bed.

  
“So, tell me Bond…and please use small words as my head is still fuzzy from Morphine…if I had told you that I had been shot, what would you have done?” she said quietly, using the tone she used when he was being stupid.

  
Bond looked at her, dumbfounded she would even ask.

  
“I would have tended to you, called for help, done something other than send you and Kincade through a dirty tunnel and across an open field in the dark.”

  
“You mean you would have stopped fighting Silva and his men, almost guaranteeing the death of you, me, and Kincade?”

  
Bond looked hard at her, his anger rising again. Only this time the anger wasn’t because she was stupid and stubborn, but because she was right. He would have stopped to help her and he wouldn’t have focused on Silva and the things he needed to do to stop him.

  
At that instant Bond knew that no matter how good he was at killing, she would always beat him at the intelligence game.

  
“I didn’t say anything Bond because I needed you to be a Double-O in the service and focus on the job at hand, destroying Silva. I’m right and you know it,” she said angrily. She shifted in her bed, the best she could.

  
“And I’m bloody well not a hypocrite, Bond. I’ve sacrificed many agents over the years for Queen and country, including you and Silva. I know when a sacrifice has to be made for success of mission and I’m strong enough to make that decision, even if that means my own life.”

  
With that she had rolled over onto her side, turning her back on him and ending the conversation. Bond had sat and stared at the back of her head until he finally heard her breaths even out to those of deep, drugged sleep.

***

And he was still staring at the back of her head when he realized she was talking to him, but facing away from him, looking at Tanner.

  
“I don’t know, he’s a thousand miles away,” he heard her say.

  
“I’m here, sorry, just thinking.”

  
She turned back toward him and looked into his eyes. Her gaze had always been powerful, captivating, her blue eyes holding sway over anyone who looked into them for too long. Bond had long lost count how many times he had fallen into those pools of blue and then struggled to crawl out with his sanity intact. He did what he always did and looked away. She knew him so well, knew what he had been thinking, knew the scenes that replayed in his mind whenever they met, remembered the conversation in the hospital. He could never get anything by her and he wondered why he still even tried.

  
“Bond, what are you doing for Christmas and Boxing Day?” M asked as Tanner walked away.

  
“No plans. Mallory has put me on quiet time, whatever that means.”

  
In private with the current Chief, Bond referred to him as M. But with her he was Mallory. She was M. Always would be. Calling her Olivia was difficult and he couldn’t do it, even though he had known her real name years before she retired. She had never once corrected him, though and Bond had heard her correct many others on the SIS staff when they had slipped and called her M.

  
“Come to the country house with me and my family. All of us will be there, but there is plenty of room for you.”

  
“That’s okay, M, I don’t want to intrude.”

  
“Nonsense, come up and stay for as long as you want. There are plenty of places for you to hide if you get tired of my family. It will be my 3 children and their families, although only my daughter will be staying at the house,” she continued as she turned to walk toward the elevator. Her cane made a soft tapping noise on the floor and Bond slowed to match his pace to hers. She had refused extensive physical therapy, said she was too old and it wouldn’t make a difference.

  
“Come up the 24th, any time after noon, stay as long as you like. And no presents, we only get them for the children.”

***

Bond balanced a bottle of Courvoisier cognac and a bouquet of flowers as he rang the doorbell. Almost instantly it was answered by a woman, about Bond’s age, well dressed and holding a glass of wine.

  
“You must be Mr. Bond..?” she asked.

  
“You are correct.”

  
“Come in, please. I’m Charlotte Eggerman,” she said. She closely resembled M but was a few inches taller and had a younger woman’s face and figure. The daughter.

  
Bond handed her the flowers.

  
“For you, Happy Christmas.”

  
“Aren’t you charming,” Charlotte said, taking the flowers and extending her hand. “Happy Christmas. This way, she’s in the kitchen.”

  
Bond followed her into the kitchen where M was standing, also holding a glass of wine and leaning heavily on her cane. She was deep into a light-hearted argument with two men, both also around Bond’s age. Bond handed her the bottle of cognac.

  
“Happy Christmas, M,” he said, giving her a quick kiss on the check.

  
“Thank you, Bond, and Happy Christmas to you,” she responded, returning his kiss.

  
She made quick introductions of her sons, Derek and Samson. M noticed the flowers in Charlotte’s hands and smiled at Bond. She had told Bond that Charlotte was recently divorced and still feeling a little put out. She knew Bond would never make a move on her own daughter, but it made her happy to know he was at least trying to be thoughtful toward her.

  
“Grandmother,” came a voice from the table in the corner. A young girl, no more than 15, was putting icing on gingerbread cookies.

  
“Yes, dear,” M responded.

  
“Why did he call you M?”

  
“Oh, just an old nickname from work,” she replied, winking at Bond.

***

Christmas Eve and Day came and went. The children received presents; the adults drank wine and cognac. Bond found that M’s family truly enjoyed each others company. He also quickly discovered that his former boss had a dry sense of humor and enjoyed teasing her grown children. And they enjoyed teasing her.

  
True to her word, Bond was pleased to find that they also sometimes went to separate corners to play games, have quiet conversations, or read. If he showed interest he was invited in or he could go off by himself for peace and quiet.

  
After Boxing Day dinner, Bond went out to the library. He was looking at a photograph on the mantle of Charlotte and a man, taken on their wedding day. He noted that she was beautiful and looked happy.

  
He heard the soft footfalls behind him.

  
“Evening, Mr. Bond. Can I get you anything?” Charlotte asked, pouring herself a drink from the bar.

  
“I’m good. Will you ever call me James?”

  
“Probably not. Don’t be offended. It’s only because mum calls you ‘Bond’.”

  
She came and stood beside him.

  
“I’m sorry to hear about your divorce. You look so happy,” he said, pointing to the photograph.

  
“Oh, Mr. Bond, that’s not me!” she stated, chuckling. “That’s my mum and dad. In 1965.”

  
Bond was startled. He was certain that the woman in the photograph was Charlotte. He looked again. He still saw Charlotte and not M. And he still thought she was beautiful.

  
“Shhh, don’t tell anyone, but Derek arrived 7 months after the wedding,” Charlotte said, snickering.

  
“Her secret is safe with me.”

  
He sat on the couch and she sat next to him, just close enough for a conversation but not close enough to be uncomfortable.

  
They sat in silence. Finally Charlotte spoke.

  
“Will you tell me what happened to my mum in Scotland?”

  
Bond looked at her, surprised that M had not told her children.

  
“She never told you?”

  
“No. We read about the attack at the hearing and the chaos that followed. Tanner called us and said that mum and an agent, I’m assuming that was you, had gone on mission to Scotland. Next time I heard Tanner’s voice he was calling to say that she was wounded, in hospital in Glasgow, in critical condition.”

  
“I’m sorry, I can’t fill in the blanks.”

  
“It’s just that me and my brothers, we know she’s broken,” she continued, as if he hadn’t spoken. “We just don’t know what, or who, broke her. And that’s a very large piece of information missing in our lives,” she said, quietly.

  
“I’m sorry. I wish I could tell you.”

  
Charlotte turned toward him, her eyes pleading Bond for more information.

  
“Please, Mr. Bond, give me something. Tell me something. At least what happened to her, what caused her injuries. We don’t even know.”

  
“Charlotte, I am quite fond of your mum. She’s been a mentor to me and I’m grateful for all she’s taught me. I have a lot of respect for her and I won’t go against her wishes,” he responded.

  
Charlotte sighed. Bond wondered if she knew how truly like her mum she really was. He didn’t see it in the sons.

  
He could tell that his answer frustrated her.

  
“But,” he continued. “I will ask her why she won’t tell you. Perhaps I can persuade her to fill you in.”

  
She seemed to like that answer, although Bond guessed she knew as well as he did that her mother could never be persuaded to do anything she truly did not want to do. He got up to go upstairs to bed.

  
“She must be quite fond of you, too,” Charlotte said as he reached the door. “She’s never brought an agent home with her. Bodyguards and drivers, yes. But never an agent.”

***

Bond knocked softy on M’s door, not wanting to disturb her if she was already asleep.

  
“Come in.”

  
He opened the door and walked in. M was sitting in the middle of her 4-post bed, propped up on pillows and reading a book. She had on her pajamas and bathrobe and was wrapped in a small blanket. She looked warm, comfortable.

  
“Bond. What’s on your mind?”

  
Bond broke about a dozen unspoken rules and sat down on the bed, opposite her, his back resting on the footboard. He thought about kicking off his shoes but just hung his feet over the side instead.

  
“I had a nice talk with Charlotte earlier.”

  
M held his gaze but Bond detected a small shift in her mood. He wondered if she thought Bond was trying to make a move on her daughter. He almost laughed out loud. Bond could break into her house, kill targets she wanted taken alive, and piss off the CIA and she would get angry but move on. She would make the rest of his life a living hell if he even thought about touching her daughter.

  
“She asked me what happened in Scotland. Said she knew about Silva, the shooting at the hearing, and the other insane stuff that he did. But none of them know how you were wounded, what happened. They’re curious.”

  
M continued to hold his gaze, her blue eyes boring into him to the point where he was uncomfortable. Then she smirked, probably because she realized he wasn’t after her daughter. It took a minute for her to regain her composure.

  
“There are things that they will never know about my life, my career at MI6. Skyfall is one of those things,” she said. “It’s the hazard of the trade. Even my husband never fully understood what my job entailed and he was smart enough to eventually stop asking.”

  
“They love you, are concerned about you.”

  
“I know. What did you say?”

  
“That I wouldn’t go against your wishes but that I would talk to you. See if I could persuade you to tell them.”

  
The silence between them was palpable. Bond had something else to ask her and she knew it. Something more than why she had hid Skyfall from her family. But she was going to make him say the words. She never made things easy for him when he wanted something.

  
“I want to know why you removed Silva’s files,” Bond said finally. She didn’t seem all surprised at his request but made no attempt to answer him.

  
He continued.

  
“It’s not like the files are there and have a separate clearance. I went looking for them. They are just not there.”

  
“No, they’re not. I removed them. They are where you’ll ever find them, no matter how hard you look.”

  
“Why? I think I have the right to read them.”

  
“No, you don’t.”

  
“Bloody hell, M, I killed him. Remember? Killed him while he was holding a gun to your head. Killed him after one of his men had put lead into your backside,” Bond was getting a little angry.

  
“I understand that, Bond,” she said, her voice calm and unfazed, just as it had been that day in the hospital. Sometimes Bond hated that she could stay so calm when he was so angry.

  
“What’s in those files you’re not telling me?”

  
“There are parts of this story that you can never know.”

  
Bond suddenly moved forward and crawled toward her, placing his hands on either side of her body. She never moved, never flinched, even as he got close enough to smell lavender on her skin. Their noses were almost touching.

  
“I’m not leaving this bed until you tell me what I want to know,” he said forcefully, moving a bit closer.

  
She held his gaze, his eyes only inches from hers, before she finally answered with a whispered ‘okay’.

  
He moved away from her and leaned back against the footboard. This time he did kick off his shoes.

  
“You know, I have never been in bed with a Double-O,” she said. “Or any agent for that matter.”

  
“Glad I could be your first,” he shot back. “And I never thought I’d ever be in bed with a woman and we’d both be fully dressed.”

  
“If I think about all the times I’ve been in this bed with…”

  
“M, you’re stalling, stop it or I’ll…”

  
“Silva was my son,” she said simply.

  
Bond didn’t understand her words, thought he had misunderstood what she had said.

  
“You mean he was like a son to you?”

  
“No, he was my son. My firstborn.”

  
“Jesus Christ, M how the hell…”

  
She cut him off instantly, now with rising anger in her voice.

  
“Quiet! No interruptions.”

  
Bond shut up and listened. She had a story to tell and she was going to tell it her way.

  
“When I was a young girl, just 24 and attending university, I was attacked one night. I was walking across the quad, it was dark. A man came out of nowhere and dragged me into the bushes. He beat me, raped me, left me for dead.

  
She shifted a bit, pulling the blanket over her shoulders.

  
“Three months later I’m pregnant. I have no idea who the father is and my father is terribly unpleased with the whole situation. He was the head of pediatrics at London Hospital but before that had served for years as an advisor to the intelligence community. He was private physician for two of my predecessors.

  
“My father, he took care of everything. I sat in the house and grew unbearably large. When I went into labor he took me to hospital and put me under anesthesia. Hours later, I awoke, the baby was gone. I never saw it, never even knew if it was a boy or a girl. I went home and we never spoke of it again.”

  
M stopped speaking and it was several moments before Bond realized he was now expected to ask questions.  
“Are you saying Silva was..?”

  
“After I recovered from Skyfall and before I officially retired, I looked through the forensic evidence that had been gathered. All of the computer files, letters, clippings. Things started falling into place, a prevalent theme throughout all of his actions and words. So I…”

  
“You did a DNA analysis,” Bond interrupted.

  
“Yes. And he was my son.”

  
“But, at Station H, you had access to his files. You had to have seen his birth certificate. Even if it didn’t have your name on it, surely you would have pieced together the birthdate, location, lack of parents’ names..?”

  
Bond wasn’t sure if he was asking the right questions, or if he was even supposed to be asking questions now. Sometimes M made up the rules of the game as she went along and he found it difficult to follow.

  
“I saw his birth certificate. You forget, my father was a very powerful man in both the intelligence and medical fields. He forged a birth certificate…put the names of his adoptive parents on it. There were no blank fields on the certificate, no adoption papers. On paper, he was Tiego Rodriguez, the son, by birth, of Raoul and Sylvia Rodriguez.”

  
“And yet…somehow…he found out…”

  
“Somehow he found out.”

  
M swung her legs over Bond’s and stood up next to the bed. He watched as she hobbled without her cane to the cabinet and poured whiskey into two glasses. She returned and handed him a glass. She crawled back onto the bed and pulled the blanket back up to her shoulders.

  
“Cheers,” she said, holding her glass out to him.

  
“Cheers,” he responded. The glasses clinked, filling the silence with something resembling Christmas music.

  
“Did he know when you two were at Station H?”

  
“I don’t think so. I’ve replayed our interaction over a thousand times in my head. I don’t remember anything that indicated he knew I was his mother. He must have found out after escaping the Chinese. The double betrayal must have pushed him over the edge.”

  
“I wonder if…” Bond started to ask, not sure if he were asking the right question.

  
“…if he thought I knew who he was?” she finished his question for him.

  
Bond was getting good at the rules of this game.

  
“I don’t know.”

  
“Does your family know?”

  
“My husband knew I had had a child before we married and that it had been given up for adoption. I told him when I was pregnant with Derek. He couldn’t understand my lack of joy at being pregnant for the first time. It really changed the relationship he had with my father,” she said.

“My children do not know.”

  
Bond held her gaze, this time not looking away. He wanted to fall into those blue eyes, see what she was seeing, see the world from her point of view.

  
He’d always known that a woman with a career spanning many years and levels of intelligence would have secrets. They all had secrets. But this was not just a secret. This was a revelation. He thought of Silva, the tall, blond man who bore no resemblance to M in any way. No mannerisms, no method of speech, nothing. Just like her two sons.

  
Then a new mental scene was added to the ever-present collection from the church at Skyfall.

  
Even though Silva had finally cornered her and had her in his grasp, even though he forced the gun into her hand and held it to her head, he had still been tender with her, careful to not make her feel any more physical pain. Silva must have known as he held her that she was frightened, so he had held her gently, the way a son might hold his mother. Bond remembered throwing the knife at the center of his back, silently praying Silva wouldn’t move out of the way and the knife hit M. Bond would never be able to live with the memory of killing…

  
Bond’s head suddenly jerked up with a realization.

  
“What?” she asked, a bit alarmed.

  
“I killed your son.”

  
The admittance was deep and painful and almost more than he could bear. He had been the cause of pain and suffering for many women in the past. Some beaten, even tortured and killed, after he had gotten information from them, often during sex. And it had never bothered him. But causing this woman pain was different. It bothered him.

  
“You killed a terrorist with no compunction on the taking innocent human life,” she responded, coldly. “He doesn’t get special dispensation just because I gave birth to him. I have no remorse over what happened.”

  
“You say that quite a bit, M. ‘No remorse. It’s not part of our job’.”

  
“It’s not. And once you feel remorse over your actions then you become useless to the service.”

  
Bond looked at her.

  
“Bond if you feel even the slightest bit of guilt over this then you are useless to me,” she said.

  
“I mean, useless to the service, to M,” she said quickly.

  
She corrected herself quickly enough but Bond had caught her true meaning. After her retirement their relationship had changed. From former colleagues with a shared traumatic event to a comfortable easiness where they could relax in each others company, even crack jokes. It had changed even more over the past few days. She had invited him into her home, let him meet her family.

  
And now their relationship had once again changed, this time in an instant now that he knew what she had known for years. His reaction to her news about Silva was going to determine what path their relationship now took, whether they would be able to stay friends, maybe even becoming closer, or if there would always be this between them. Bond didn’t want to lose the closeness he had with her, but he wasn’t quite sure what to do.

  
“Your family deserves to know,” he said, hopefully distracting her.

  
“No, they will never know this.”

  
“You’re causing them great distress,” he pushed. “You’re hurting them more than you know.”

  
“Good night, Bond,” she said, placing her glass on the nightstand. She sat silently and waited for him to leave.

  
He tried to catch her gaze but read nothing in her eyes. They were cold and distant. Almost ten minutes passed before Bond finally got up and left the room, angry and frustrated.

***

Bond awoke late the next morning. He quickly packed and planned on leaving after bidding good-bye to M and her family.

  
He found the downstairs living areas to be deserted. He heard a TV playing and walked into the back room. Derek’s son was sitting there.

  
“Where is everyone?”

  
“Grandmother called a family meeting. Her, my dad, my aunt, and my uncle went to breakfast,” he said not even looking up.

***

Bond watched as the large blue sedan pulled into the driveway. His intent had been to leave before M and her family returned. But he was too late.

  
M got out of the front passenger’s seat and walked over to him, steadying her cane on the slick surface.

  
“Leaving?”

  
“Yes, it’s time to get back to the real world,” he said.

  
“Thank you for coming up here. It was nice to see you again.” He looked into her eyes but still couldn’t read what was there. This time she was the one who looked away.

  
“Come back whenever you want. I’m here more than London.”

  
“Thank you, and happy new year,” he said, leaning to give her a farewell kiss on the cheek. Her return invitation gave him hope that their friendship was intact. It might take some work, but it was still there.

  
She turned and started walking into the house. Bond was suddenly aware that Charlotte was standing next to him. She placed her hand on his arm.

  
“Thank you,” was all she said before she turned and followed her mother up the driveway.

  
Derek and Samson both got out of the cars and walked by Bond. They didn’t say anything, just nodded and smiled.

  
Bond didn’t know how much M had told her children and he surmised he would never know. As far as he was concerned, this was all behind them now.

  
James Bond got into his own car and drove back towards London.


End file.
